P's English Major: Take a Bow

I graduated from the English department around 5 years ago and at that time, I never thought I would live to witness this: My beloved English major is on the verge of collapsing.

One bitter thing that is so plain to see is how few the number of the freshmen is. It just goes down rapidly from more than a hundred in my batch to just *gulp* thirty five. With thirty five new students, you just need maximum -though ineffective- two classes per subjects. This is like insane. There used to be up to six parallel classes per subject.

That's not all. The words buzzing in the air is that the literature subjects are being cut clean from the curriculum. The ones which are going to be emphasized are classes for language skills. A friend of a friend said yesterday, "How weird. You still can learn all those language skills by joining those English courses. Why eliminate those literature subjects? What's specific is there to learn in that department?" She got a point there.

Later on that day, I went to the library accompanying a friend borrowing some books. After some time, my eyes went to those big shelves where all the literature references are placed. And I came closer. When I walked down their aisles, it was like walking down the memory lane. Those shelves, those books were once so familiar to me. Those hard covered old books whose pages exude funny smell were once held by these hands. My fingers, once, were running down those worn out pages, looking for some war history or some analysis of certain poem. And when there was some spare time to spend, I would be holding one of those fiction books, engulfing myself in its world. Then it hit me: if the English major does not survive, who would care about these good old books? Who would bother to check a book with Nathaniel Hawthorne's name on the cover? Or Charles Dickens? Or any other literary figures of this world? At that point, suddenly I became so sad.

Pulling myself away from those deserted aisles with a heartbreaking thought in my mind, I said to myself that maybe the time had come. Although, like I said, I had never imagined that I would live to see this, the awful truth had arrived. Maybe not fully arrived, but it couldn't be less certain. Maybe, it's time for the English major to take a bow; a deep bow in front of everybody, marking the exit point of its existence before the curtain falls.

And I still feel sad. Very sad.

(my room, june 12, 23:16)